Can a Judicial Officer Challenge Collegium's Choice of High Court Judges? Supreme Court Declines to Interfere

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to entertain a plea filed by Himachal Pradesh judicial officer Arvind Malhotra challenging the recommendation of three officers for appointment as judges of the Himachal Pradesh High Court.

Malhotra, presently serving as Principal Judge of the Family Court at Dharamshala, had challenged the Supreme Court collegium's June 3 recommendation of judicial officers Chirag Bhanu Singh, Bhupesh Sharma and Yogesh Jaswal for elevation to the high court.

The petitioner's primary grievance was that officers junior to him had been recommended for appointment while his own candidature was overlooked.

When the matter was taken up, Senior Advocate Balbir Singh, for the judicial officer, argued that Malhotra's name was not reconsidered by the high court collegium after the Supreme Court's 2024 order in a plea moved by him and judicial officer Chirag Bhanu Singh.

To this, Justice BV Nagarathna said that there was no rejection of his candidature. "We don't know what your recommendation says. It is about subjective satisfaction of the high court collegium. Can supreme court on judicial side ask them look into this and look into that? If this happens then where are we heading?" she observed.

Adding to this, Justice Joymalya Bagchi said, "We would have understood if the high court collegium went against the SC order, but their decision has been accepted by the Supreme Court."

Concluding the hearing, Justice Nagarathna observed that no procedural infirmity could be found in the collegium's decision-making process. Cautioning against opening a "Pandora's box", she noted that the petitioner still had nearly a decade of service remaining and disposed off the matter.

The development is the latest in a small number of cases where members of the district judiciary have approached the Supreme Court claiming that their cases for elevation were not adequately considered despite seniority and experience.

Malhotra himself was among the petitioners in an earlier dispute concerning elevation to the Himachal Pradesh High Court.

In 2024, Malhotra and judicial officer Chirag Bhanu Singh approached the Supreme Court after the Himachal Pradesh High Court collegium recommended two other judicial officers for elevation.

The two officers pointed out that they had earlier been recommended for elevation by the high court collegium in December 2022. Their cases were subsequently deferred by the Supreme Court collegium. On January 4, 2024, the Supreme Court collegium resolved that the proposal regarding their elevation be remitted for reconsideration. According to the petitioners, before reconsidering their cases, the high court collegium proceeded to recommend two other judicial officers for appointment. They argued that if those officers were elevated ahead of them, their seniority and long service records would be adversely affected.

The Supreme Court, then also, had ultimately held that the reconsideration contemplated by the Supreme Court collegium could not be undertaken by the chief justice of the high court acting individually and had to be carried out through the collective process of the high court collegium. Court had directed reconsideration of the petitioners' cases in accordance with the prescribed procedure. The judgment did not determine whether the petitioners ought to be elevated, but focused on whether the collegium process had been properly followed.

An earlier challenge involving allegations of supersession had also reached the Supreme Court from Tamil Nadu.

In R. Poornima & Others v. Union of India (2020), a group of district judges challenged recommendations made by the Madras High Court collegium for appointment of judges to the Madras High Court. The petitioners contended that officers junior to them had been recommended while their own names had been left out. They sought quashing of the recommendation list insofar as it included their juniors and sought consideration of their own candidature for elevation.

According to the petitioner judges, they possessed superior service records, greater experience and higher positions in the seniority list. They further alleged that the collegium had not applied uniform standards while evaluating candidates and that similarly situated officers had been treated differently. The Supreme Court, however, declined to interfere, reiterating the limited scope of judicial review in matters involving assessment of merit and suitability for judicial appointments.

Taken together, the cases reflect a consistent judicial approach towards challenges arising from non-elevation or alleged supersession. While courts have examined whether established procedures governing the collegium process have been followed, they have generally refrained from reassessing the comparative merits of candidates considered for appointment to constitutional courts.

The dismissal of Malhotra's plea on Monday adds another chapter to that line of decisions, underscoring the limited scope for judicial intervention in collegium recommendations concerning appointments to the high courts.